874 
troops both in the battle zone and on the lines of 
communication, but it was not until April 1915 that 
a geologist was appointed, and not until the following 
June that he joined the staff of the Chief Engineer 
in France. In 1916 Lieut.-Col. Sir T. W. Edgeworth 
David joined the staff and eventually became Geological 
Adviser at G.H.Q. on matters connected with military 
mining. Now a permanent geological establishment 
is suggested. 
The volume under review gives a concise account 
of the work carried out by the geological staff on the 
Western Front and is copiously illustrated by maps, 
sections, and photographs. The chief method of 
supply of water was from borings in the Upper Chalk 
(Senonian), and though in many cases the sites for 
bores were chosen for military rather than geological 
considerations, the maps showing the possibilities of 
obtaining a supply in different parts of the area were 
invaluable to the Army Water Supply officers. Water 
was also obtained from the Thanet Sands, and the 
various kinds of apparatus employed in boring and 
pumping are described in detail. 
An investigation of the water-table in the Chalk 
was made in connexion with water supply, and the 
fluctuations of level were studied for the purposes of 
military mining and the construction of dug-outs. 
The importance of a thorough knowledge of geological 
structure in connexion with the construction of 
military mines is demonstrated, and details are given 
of several series the success of which depended on such 
knowledge. 
Other military activities requiring the services of 
the geologist were the winning of road-metal, the 
provision of sand and aggregate for concrete, and the 
working of such coal mines as remained in the hands 
of the Allies. 
The plates include a map showing by colour-washes 
the suitability of the country for dug-outs and others 
indicating the ancient excavations (“ Souterrains ”), 
which were so largely used as cover for troops in 
Northern France. 
The second volume under notice contains an interest- 
ing account of the enormous difficulties successfully 
overcome by the Royal Engineers in the supply of 
water to the army during its advance across the 
Desert of Sinai from Egypt into Palestine. 
The work included the laying of a pipe-line, by means 
of which a daily supply of 600,000 gallons of Nile 
water was carried to the troops in El Arish, and along 
the lines of communication ; the transport of water 
in railway tanks and on camels; the development 
of local supplies in Beersheba and Ghaza and in the 
plains of Palestine, and finally the reorganisation of 
the water supply of Jerusalem itself. 
NO. 2800, VOL. IT1] 
NATURE 

[JUNE 30, 1923 
The Antiquity of Disease. 
The Antiquity of Disease. By Prof. Roy L. Moodie. 
(University of Chicago Science Series.) Pp. xiv+ 
148. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press; London: 
Cambridge University Press, 1923.) 1.50 dollars. 
Studies in the Paleopathology of Egypt. 
Armand Ruffer. Edited by Prof. R. L. Moodie. 
Pp. xx+372+71 plates. (Chicago: The Uni- 
versity of Chicago Press; London: Cambridge 
University Press, 1921.) 17s. net. 
T a time when those concerned with medical educa- 
tion are concentrating their endeavours as never 
before upon the problems of the causes and prevention 
of disease, a book that attempts to probe into the 
distant past and discover the early history of patho- 
logical processes is sure of a welcome, even if the 
subject is described by the wholly unnecessary and 
ambiguous word “ paleopathology.” The chief value 
of Prof. Roy Moodie’s fascinating and well-illustrated 
little book is that it directs attention to the scope and 
interest of such studies and provides a: bibliography 
extensive enough to start the inquirer on his way to 
enlightenment. The pathological conditions revealed 
in fossil vertebrates, and the identification of the 
destruction wrought in fossil bones by contemporary 
bacteria and fungi, prepare us to accept the evidence 
that bodies resembling bacteria and cocci in fossils as 
old as the Paleozoic are actually fossilised micro- 
organisms. 
The part played by bacteria in remotely ancient — 
times is as yet only a subject for speculation. “ The 
pre-Cambrian bacteria so far known are supposed to 
have had an activity allied to that described by 
Drew for Bacterium calcis and other marine calcium- 
precipitating bacteria.’ “The results of infection by 
bacteria are not definitely known prior to the Permian. 
Bacteria and fungi, possibly, however, chiefly those of 
decay, are widely distributed and well known from the 
Carboniferous rocks. Here lies a wide field of research, 
although a difficult one, dealing with the origin of 
that type of disease which is so troublesome to humanity 
to-day. It seems probable from present evidences that 
a wide distribution of the bacterial types of disease and 
the resulting pathology is a relatively recent pheno- 
menon, with an antiquity of a few million years, which, 
when compared with the scores of millions, possibly 
hundreds of millions, of years which animal and plant 
life have existed, is a very brief time ” (pp. 13 and 14). 
The earlier part of the book, which deals with these 
interesting problems of paleontology, is very suggestive 
and stimulating. The latter part, dealing with early 
man, makes a more immediate and personal appeal and 
is distinguished by the same qualities of suggestiveness ; 
By Sir Marc | 
